Each Wednesday, The World Africa presents three new musical releases from or inspired by the continent. This week, head to Angola with the nostalgia of Bonga, the energy of Lucia de Carvalho and the romanticism of C4 Pedro.
“Ti Zuela”, by Bonga
His beautiful scratchy voice had conquered our ears with the piece Mona Ki Ngi Xica, recorded in 1972 in Rotterdam. Since then, Bonga has distilled it over more than 400 songs, including, in November 2020, Kudia Kuetu, a duet with the French singer Camélia Jordana which appears on the new album of the legend of semba, Kintal and Banda, to be published on Friday February 18 on the occasion of his 50-year career.
An opus full of nostalgia for the man who, now 79 years old, has built his life in exile between Paris and Lisbon. He scrolls through the memories of the court of his childhood in Luanda, as in the title You Zuela where he mentions “the eternal talkers who end up pronouncing essential truths”.
« Awakens », by Lucia de Carvalho (feat. Chico César)
Born in Luanda, Lucia de Carvalho left Angola, still a child, for Portugal and then France. And it was in Meistratzheim, a village in Alsace where she grew up with a host family, that she rediscovered her musical roots through… Brazilian sounds and the group Som Brasil, in which she sang and danced and will drum for ten years before going solo in 2008.
After the album Calm in 2016, she published Pwanga (“light”, in the Tchokwé language) mid-January: a ten-track opus which, not content with surveying Portuguese-speaking territories, borrows from gospel and oriental music, as in the piece Awake, in duet with the Brazilian Chico César.
« It’s OK », by C4 Pedro
We end this selection with Pedro Henrique alias “C4 Pedro”, 38 years old, son of musician Lisboa Santos, brother of singer Lil Saint and author of five albums since 2008, including the last, Bipolar, in 2020. Born in Luanda, he lived for ten years in Belgium, where he began his musical career before returning to Angola in 2009.
Posted on February 7, his latest music video, Everything is fine (“everything is fine”, in Portuguese), has already been viewed more than 400,000 times on YouTube, while more than 200,000 listeners each month listen to this singer of kizomba (a genre derived from semba and influenced by zouk) who is exported as well to Portugal as to France or the Netherlands.
Find all the musical favorites of the editorial staff in the playlist YouTube from World Africa.